Regional Usenet Newsgroups

Talk about Usenet, or the Internet in general, and most people become fascinated by the concept of a global network that ignores national borders and physical boundaries.  Usenet, they will say, unites people based on what they're into, not where they live.  But the truth is that the Internet benefits people no matter what the scale: Global, national, and even local. Just ask any mom-and-pop business with its own Web site.

On Usenet, you can see these differences of scale in the form of regional newsgroups, top-level Usenet hierarchies devoted to a particular country, city, or other area.  Some of them are ghost towns – abandoned to spam and off-topic postings – while others serve basic community needs, such as classified ads and help-wanted postings.

But some online communities are full of life, going beyond the basics to reflect the unique personalities of the regions they serve.  In this article, we'll look at some of these standout newsgroups, starting with perhaps the most obvious of them all: The spiritual home of the high-tech boom.

San Francisco

Leave it to the San Francisco Bay Area, north of Silicon Valley, to push Usenet to its full potential as a regional information tool.  The newsgroups in the ba.* section go far beyond the normal jobs and classifieds groups most regions settle for, and also paint a picture of what's on San Franciscans' minds.  For starters, they like bicycles and motorcycles, the better to get around San Francisco's insane traffic.  Notorious foodies, they swap tips on where to get the best dim sum.  Many have fled into the mountains, where they fret about mountain lions and networking their houses together.  Which leads to the Bay Area's greatest passion:  All things Internet.

Chicago

All right, San Francisco is no-brainer, but Chicago?  Sure, the City of the Big Shoulders is Usenet-savvy; what's it to you?  Chicago's small array of newsgroups is strictly meat-and-potatoes (with a bit too much spam), but it still has a lot of local flavor, particularly in chi.general, where nearly every serious question gets hijacked by some wise guy with a smart remark.  A browse through chi.eats suggests that Chicago isn't all about meat (just mostly).  The chi.jobs board is a pretty good place to look for work.  But the funniest place of all is chi.weather, with "The REAL Weather" from "Trent," cryptic mini-forecasts like "DUBIOUS," "MONEY," and "READY TO RUMBLE." (Luckily, someone else posts a more useful daily forecast.)

Ottawa

Canada's segment of Usenet is appropriately vast, with newsgroups in the can.* section covering the whole country, plus sections for cities and regions like Montreal and Toronto. But no region "gets" Usenet quite like Ottawa.  If their newsgroups are any example, Ottawans are cooperative, pull-together kind of people.  Ottawa's Usenet has not one, but four newsgroups with buy-and-sell classifieds, a jobs newsgroup with lots of listings, an events board, daily weather reports, real estate listings, information for kayaking and sailing, even a small board for Ottawa's Vietnamese community.  And every city should have a board like ott.rides, where high-tech hitchhikers find rideshare partners.

United Kingdom

Many countries and regions have their own little corner of Usenet, but with over 380 newsgroups, the huge uk.* hierarchy is more like a Usenet unto itself.  Indeed, the uk.local.* section alone has over 40 groups, so whether it's Ayrshire or Yorkshire, Birmingham, Kent, Glasgow, and of course London, the British can find plenty of discussions of interest to their community.  (The British don't tend to cross-post too much, so local topics stay local.)  Other uniquely British institutions, such as "the Beeb," get intense scrutiny in the uk.media.radio.* section.  The British love their football, of course, and newsgroups devoted to their favorite teams, like Celtic and Liverpool, are very active, but you might be surprised to learn that the Brits take a small interest in American baseball as well.

Meet the Silversurfers: Determined not to let the computer revolution pass them by, England's senior citizens have embraced the "Silversurfer" movement, a variety of social and government initiatives to get over-60's online.  The high point was the creation of uk.people.silversurfers in 2002, and after only two years, it's already one of UK Usenet's liveliest groups.  It's also one of the friendliest; hardly a day goes by without a "good morning" discussion thread, in which the regulars just check in to say hello and catch up on each others' lives.  The 'Surfers have members all over Great Britain and even have a few friends in the USA; You can learn more on one of many Silversurfers web sites.

Australia/New Zealand

Like the British, folks in Australia and New Zealand have their own "Usenet-in-a-Usenet" with a collection of newsgroups that mirror the topics of the broader Usenet community – computers, movies, television, politics, investments, automobiles – with a local flavor.  The Aussies also reveal their healthy skepticism about government and media in aus.media-watch and aus.censorship, their passion for football, rugby and cricket in the aus.sport.* groups, and their love of the outdoors in aus.bicycle and aus.bushwalking.  New Zealanders don’t have as many newsgroups as the Australians, but they do have regional newsgroups in nz.reg.* for places like Auckland, Canterbury, Dunedin, and Wellington, among others.